A tragic car crash sank Freshwater two months after opening last year. It has returned to the scene of the accident.

When Calvin Davis pulled up to Freshwater on the morning of June 17, 2017, it looked like a bomb had gone off. His restaurant was bleeding out onto Southwest Trafficway like an open wound.

“It was awful — the worst thing I could imagine,” Davis says.

Overnight, a sedan had hit a tow truck, then plowed directly into Freshwater. A teenage passenger in the sedan died. And Davis’ restaurant, just two months old, was well beyond saving.

“All the thoughts you would think go through a person’s head went through mine: I’m just gonna give up. This isn’t worth it. This is too hard. I can’t do it,” Davis says. “I started to think a lot about karma. What did I do to other people to deserve this?”

Not a dramatic person by nature, Davis decided to brush those thoughts away and figure out how to reopen Freshwater, which had taken him two years to bring to fruition.

But there was no easy fix. The building had serious structural damage, and for weeks after the accident it sat agape, uncovered and exposed to the elements. Davis began looking for other locations for Freshwater. Nothing felt right. His plans stalled.

In August 2017, Davis received a call from Bill Haw, Jr., an entrepreneur/art gallerist whose family owns several properties in the West Bottoms, including the Livestock Exchange Building. The Haws were looking for an experienced chef to take over the restaurant at one of their non-Kansas City properties, the Hotel Frederick, in Boonville, Missouri. The restaurant had lost money for years, Haw explained, and a change was needed. Davis jumped on the opportunity. He now owns the restaurant, which has been renamed Revival at the Frederick. The Haws are his landlords.

Davis has been committed to reviving Revival since last September. He’s made repairs to the restaurant’s infrastructure, tackled staffing problems, and completely redesigned the menu, shifting it from Cajun cuisine to elevated Midwestern comfort food. (Revival offers dishes like cornmeal-fried catfish with braised cabbage and cornbread streaked with a Korean chili sauce and kimchi.)

But Davis never abandoned his hope to reopen Freshwater. On a visit to Kansas City this past winter, he noticed that repairs were finally underway at Freshwater’s old location. He called the property owner, Damon Abnos, who confirmed that the repairs would be complete by spring, and that Davis was welcome to lease the space again if he so desired. Davis did so desire.

Since April, Davis has been building out Freshwater 2.0. His original sous chef — now chef de cuisine — Brent Gunnels is back on board. (Davis takes pride in the fact that everyone working in Freshwater’s kitchen was at a minimum a sous chef before coming to the restaurant.) Davis also brought in Chris Enss, formerly of the River Club, as general manager and wine director.

Freshwater, which officially reopened at 3711 Southwest Trafficway in early May, looks much the same as it did before last June’s crash. But some alterations have been made. There’s slightly more seating and a brand-new bar, topped in dark wood. And the bar area now has an exposed brick wall, a relic of the construction issues that plagued the building after the accident.

“The exposed brick is now a part of the story,” Gunnels says.

Davis’s menu is an homage to Freshwater’s original offerings as much as it is a look forward. Standouts include the house-cured charcuterie served with pickles and an intensely flavorful spring herb soup (served with grilled bread topped with fresh cheese), and a crudo of silky walleye (served with radishes, pea shoots, and walnuts atop a Missouri XO sauce). In the weeks and months to come, look for newer items like a subtle raviolo stuffed with house-made ricotta, and the tongue-in-cheek “Silence of the Hams”: fava bean shoots with pork liver and a chianti glaze.

Davis and his team remain committed to sourcing nearly all of their ingredients from Kansas and Missouri, utilizing local farms including Woodland City, Prairie Birthday Farms, and Simply Natural. They recently worked with farmers connected with KC Food Circle for urgent needs, noting they were impressed with the response from growers. “Produce determines the menu,” says Gunnels. “It allows for us to have weird little things here and there that keep it fresh.”

As for Davis himself, he’s busier than ever, spending the beginning of his week with Revival in Boonville, then driving the two hours to KC to tend to Freshwater from Wednesday through Saturday. But he says he doesn’t mind the seven-day work weeks. He’s just happy to finally have his old kitchen back.  

“We’re picking up where we left off,” Davis says. “But it’s been elevated.”

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On Twitter: @aprilfleming.